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This petition illustrates how enslaved people used the rhetoric of the American Revolution to point out the colonies’ hypocrisy of demanding freedom and liberty, while themselves having slavery.

This petition illustrates how enslaved people used the rhetoric of the American Revolution to point out the colonies’ hypocrisy of demanding freedom and liberty, while themselves having slavery.

A. J. McElveen writes to the Charleston, South Carolina, enslaver Z. B. Oakes, about an enslaved man named Isaac. McElveen describes Isaac as a genius, painter, cook, carriage driver, violinist, etc.

In this letter, Lincoln offers his argument in favor of finishing the war rather than reaching a peace agreement with the Confederate government.

In reflecting on both a pivotal moment in her life during the Civil War and the longer-term effects of such an event, Mrs. Albright excludes her family from the violent system of slavery while adhering to stereotypically Southern values. The necessity of interracial intimacy is noticeable in Mrs. Albright’s descriptions.